Our Fan-Powered Interview With NIS America’s President Part 2

In the first part of our fan-powered interview we talked about Atelier series creator Gust, Black Rock Shooter: The Game developer Imageepoch, and PSP to PlayStation 3 ports. We changed topics to NIS America’s anime business, Persona 4: The Animation, Makai Wars, and Mr. Akenaga’s thoughts on the new hardware.

NIS America has a very close relationship with Sony because you have Bleach. Aside from Soul Resurrección will we see more Bleach titles from NIS America?

Haru Akenaga, President of NIS America: Any other Bleach titles out there?

There are the Heat the Soul fighting games.

Yeah, those are on PSP.

I would be surprised if Sony stopped with the latest Bleach game. Perhaps, future titles?

If it’s on PS3 we will consider it.

How did you license Bleach: Soul Resurrección from Sony?

Negotiations. [Laughs] It was pretty hard.

What do you think about bringing more anime games over from Japan?

We started our anime business two years ago and that’s why we acquired Bleach this time. We’re going to continue to get anime licensed titles. Basically, anime licenses are owned by many companies. Sometimes titles have more than ten companies owning a license and IP. It can be difficult to convince all of them. We will try, but I can’t say I can do that every time.

It’s possible. We released the Disgaea anime series and Persona: Trinity Soul. Those two titles have hardcore fans from the video games, they spent hours and hours of their time on these video games. When we released Persona: Trinity Soul and Disgaea anime we heard from fans that the world and the way the characters feel from the anime aren’t really matching up to the video games. If there is any little difference from the anime fans, Persona fans and Disgaea fans, notice it and they get disappointed because what they want is what they played transferred into anime.

We take how they respond and react to the anime seriously. When we release anime we want the fans to be happy. With Persona 4: The Animation and because we’re a video game company too, we would love to do it. But, we want to evaluate the anime first to see if it’s lives up to the video game and follows the storyline from the game perfectly, and for quality, as well. We will consider it after an evaluation.

That’s a difficult point because "some" could mean only ten [people]. Many people asked us to remake Rhapsody, that’s why we released it for the Nintendo DS. But, business-wise it was not great.

We don’t have to make much money, if our fans are satisfied with a title and we can break even, that’s fine. But, if we lose a lot of money, we can’t survive and we won’t be able to release other titles in the future. Bleach is a big title and we need to have money to localize it. In the future if there is a big title, we need to make some profit. That’s the business side.

Light novels? We can consider it. We always want our fans to be satisfied with our products. If we can break even that would be great.

What’s going on with Makai Wars1?

[Laughs.] Makai Wars? It’s still inside an eggshell. [Laughs.]

1Originally announced for PSP, Makai Wars is said to star Asagi, a cameo character in Makai Kingdom, who would be the star of her own game. Asagi then became a perpetual cameo character in other Nippon Ichi titles.

The president at the headquarters, Mr. Niikawa, is always planning Makai Wars in his mind and thinking about it. Every time I talk with him, he’s talking about Makai Wars. It’s not time for it though, there’s nothing concrete.

Nippon Ichi is working on PlayStation Vita titles, but is NIS America developing Vita titles as well, similar to how NISA is creating Cave Story for the Nintendo 3DS?

Right now, we have no plans to develop titles by ourselves. Definitely, once our headquarters develops titles we will release them here.

Can you give us any hints about the titles? Are they something new? Something we’ve seen? Something… in the Netherworld?

I would be scolded if I said anything. [Laughs]

What do you think about the Wii U?

That’s interesting. It’s an interesting system. Unfortunately, we didn’t have any information about Wii U until the morning of the press conference. Maybe, we’re going to think about it, moving forward. At this moment, we have no plans to develop for the platform.

Do you have any more Nintendo 3DS games aside from Cave Story 3D?

Not right now. Do you think we should? The market is not great now.

I think, perhaps, Disgaea 3 could use another version and it would be neat to see the sprites as paper cutouts in 3D. Also there’s the 3 and 3DS, I don’t know…

[Laughs] Good point!

Are you going to develop any more titles internally similar to how NIS America is working with Nicalis?

We have a really good relationship with them. Once we master Cave Story we’re going to talk about what’s next.

Since this interview has reader questions, what would you like to say to all of the NIS America fans?

I feel it’s wonderful that we’ve been able to survive for such a long time among the big companies. Maybe, we are still the smallest publisher in the United States. We owe everything to our fans. We really appreciate your support. Thank you very much and please continue to give us support.

Oh one more thing… there are lots of requests for Hyperdimension Neptunia Mk-2.

Point being people really want to hear the original game English dub cast back for the anime if it does get a Stateside release. So I either hope NISA can manage the dub or I think I’d rather see someone like Funimation give it a shot.

But yes, that was a great interview and Haru Akenga came off as a pretty genuine and cool guy!

epiphaniesarefun

nah, they haven’t released a dub for their anime releases yet. They’ve even mentioned that the reason is cost of the dub, at least in the beginning….

KuroAlmaz

NISA has not done an English dub. From their comments at Anime Expo, I do not think dubs are coming any time soon or at all. Dub fans, sorry. I am one of those who will buy sub or both. As of Persona 4, I would like to see the anime follow the storyline. If that is the case, I am all in. The anime is supposed to have many of the original Japanese voice actors. I would like to have an English dub of the English VA; however, I do not think there is going to be enough money for NISA to do a dub. Either sub or dub, it will be a purchase for me.

They should team up with Atlus and for some funding for a sub and dub of P4. If the anime is quality it would be a wise investment.

KuroAlmaz

That is an interesting idea. Not to mention, Atlus has the connections to the English VA for the series. I would be up for bothering Atlus provided the anime is worth a grain of salt. I believe the anime is a fall season series so I will have to wait to see if it will be worth the effort. From what I have seen on the Japanese web site for the anime, it looks and sound cool.

Possibly negotiation problems in the Western World? And we get all of their top licenses…Ben 10, Naruto, and DBZ, am I missing any?

Exkaiser

Probably because Namco-Bandai has a way higher overhead so they can’t afford to put out titles that don’t bring in very high profits the way much smaller companies like Atlus or NISA can.

But no one thinks about that, do they.

KuroAlmaz

Why not put out Tales games? N/B has been on a roll with the horde of other “sub-par” games which have been selling less numbers than the Tales series. The spiritual successor to Demon Souls is the only thing, for me, I am interested in. I am worried that the title is going to be fudged up just because N/B is involved.

I’ll gladly continue to give my full support to PS3 games published by NISA. They have really great titles, not to mention they are a lifesaver to JRPGs fans. I’m getting Neptunia MK-II in a heartbeat =D

DanteJones

“No problem.” He did it again! This guy is awesome, haha.

tbustin79

They say that NIS reads the comments on this site so I wanted to say thank you for the best gaming interview i’ve read in a very long time. You give information to your fans in ways that make sense and you clearly have your ear to what your fans want. I appreciate the effort to bring US fans what they want. I’m very excited for the Bleach game (especially the japanese voices being included) especially since its in the care of NIS. Too bad NIS couldn’t bring over some of the Tales games, the operation watergate games and hell since funimation isn’t doing it, what about the sailor moon anime on bluray?

Wackoramaco87

Very interesting, thanks! Interesting info as well on some of the business side of things- though regarding Rhapsody I think most people were just annoyed that they took the extra story content out in the US release and never gave a real reason(?).

Gotta agree with the other comments here as well, the president of NISA seems pretty cool! =)

I dont understand why people are so hung up with trinity soul not being like the persona games, i personally found the story amazing, and i didnt even thought about persona at any time (but when i saw akihiko). This is a standalone anime, and i know it has a small fanbase, but i think it was amazing and has a great meaning to give.

Also, i think we can pretty much give up on seeing a new PSP game from NISA…

What do you mean, you dont think their newest announce port has any chance at coming over, if Atlus can bring out a P2P, I honestly do not see why NISA cant give out one more PSP game before Vita comes…

Phantom brave, without counting that is newer than makai wars and La pucelle (so the IP stuff may not be as complicated) was ported to wii and then psp, and it was before they practically told us they dont see much future with the psp in our face

Quite sure more people would buy that makai game than phantom brave psp anyway since it was ported as much as you say. I honestly doubt that Phantom Brave was their final PSP game ever especially considering that even if they brought out that makai game remake on psp they can still get many sales on PSN.

KuroAlmaz

Some days I think companies have lost their minds with “re-releases.” With the writing on the wall with PSP sales, I would think one would have lost his or her mind republishing some titles like Phantom Brave. I know Disgaea and Persona can get away with it because of fans who really enjoy the series. I am not saying Makai Wars or Phantom Brave does not have fans. They are series that has not in the U.S. had the same lime light as other niche series. My sister like Phantom Brave; however, she did not find the PSP version worth buying. Some of NISA titles fall in the situation. Persona for the PSP is getting a big face lift which makes sales easier.

Passing on a remake seems like an odd decision considering much of the foundation of the game has already been set. The game cant honestly cost that much to make and be a huge financial burden, plus RPG fans in the US crave handheld RPGs.

KuroAlmaz

Don’t know what is going on with Makai Wars. There was rumors of a PSP version and an PS3 version. All I do know is PSP sales in the U.S. suck and PS3 sales are far better. Persona 3 Portable did well in sales. I guess it will depend on the game and the fans convincing NISA to put out the game. Just like their anime side, NISA is going to cut off anything that is not doing good.

KuroAlmaz

From what I been hearing, the PSP is dead. Everyone is looking forward to Vita to save the day. PSP console sales in the U.S. is nothing like Japan’s. I read an article months ago that said many of the developers have sent back their PSP development kits to Sony. I can’t really say I bought anywhere near the titles I have for the PS3 and 360 with the exception of the Wii.

The difference is that Shin Megami Tensei is Atlus’ leading brand. NISA doesn’t have one. Perhaps Atelier will grow into that brand someday, but right now, it doesn’t enjoy the popularity and prestige that the Persona games do.

vadde939

Isn’t Disgaea NISA’s leading brand?

Hours

Great interview Spencer, as usual.

Though I’m quite disappointed that NISA’s president brought up Rhapsody DS as an example of something that didn’t perform well. It’s really their own fault for the horrendous botch job they did with the English release. Cutting out so much content, misleading their fans with false reasons for the Japanese only audio (they said it was because they didn’t have English versions of the songs in the extended content, but they cut out the extended content!) after they advertised on their official web site that the new DS content would be in the game.

It’s still the worst job NISA has ever done, and I’m quite sad to see that being spun that it’s the fans fault. And this is coming from someone that’s a fan of the company!

Yeah, I agree. Rhapsody DS was the fault of the shoddy localization– I would have bought it myself, but once I heard about the bugs and faults of the game, I got the PS1 version instead! Beat it too, very cute if incredibly easy game.

I wish that Rhapsody hadn’t been as shafted as it is, we might have gotten more out of the Marl Kingdom series then, but, a ship sailed.

badmoogle

I don’t know about the NA version but i didn’t encountered any bugs at all in the PAL version of Rhapsody.I have to say i didn’t finished it though,even though i played more than halfway through it.I really couldn’t see its appeal that i’ve read about in so many reviews,i thought it was extremely easy,the random emcounters were way too frequent and its story was so childish that it was a bit embarrassing for me.I rarely put down games before i finish them,but no matter how much i tried i couldn’t force myself to finish it.:/

Cool interview though.I was surprised with his honesty towards the Wii U and 3DS.

The game /is/ extremely easy, though the random encounters weren’t that often in the PS1 version– though most likely, they changed it since the PS1 version had a tactical battlefield with every encounter, while the DS version had it be more like a traditional RPG like the next two games in the Marl Kingdom series.

But while the story is childish, I found it to have a nice ending– it’s a story about a girl who manages to find love in the prince she always wished for, and she got it by going through trials that sometimes, not even grown men would do. It’s childish, sure, and definitely girly and cutesy, but there’s some pretty dark portions of the game as well that help balance it out (especially at one point where a choice of yours could lead an entire /village/ into loathing you), and the musical portions are pretty catchy.

I found it, while it was a laughably easy game, to be a relaxing departure from the regular grind and numbers that comes with NIS games, and finishing it was a satisfying conclusion in itself.

malek86

I played the european version too. But let me say that Rhapsody, at least the DS version, was a terrible game. Incredibly short, easiest RPG ever, too many random encounters with no meaning whatsoever (what’s the point if you can just mash A and win, including bosses?), the story was laughable, the characters were underdeveloped and just thrown out there, and the ending was an anticlimax. I had to force myself to finish it, which I only did because I knew it was gonna be over very soon. I hate to say this, but I actually had more fun with Tales of the Tempest. That’s an accomplishment.

Now I heard the PS1 version was better, but I don’t really know, because I never played it. But if it spawned a cult darling like the Marl Kingdom series, it must have had some good points. I just can’t see any in this DS version.

badmoogle

Yeah i forgot to mention that i played the DS version too.

Neckbear

More anime-licensed titles?

Don’t do it, NISA! ;_;

Seriously, though, I’d like such trend to stop. Never been a fan of such, and I’d honestly prefer NISA to focus on more titles which a bigger chance of critical acclaim, for one…

Also, Makai Wars should totally be NIS next PS3 game. Do it!

Fantastic interview, however. Both parts, in fact.

KuroAlmaz

As one who like both, don’t rain on other people’s parade. NISA is keeping the anime section and gaming section separate. At Anime Expo, NISA said they are not going to destroy the gaming side with the anime releases. NISA is doing quite well with anime. At the same time, they make more money. Something that keeps NISA in business so they might put out Makai Wars.

If only our peers had all gobbled up PSPs a long time ago or if SEGA had been smart to get the Heat the Souls instead of the DS and Wii ones…

epiphaniesarefun

I can’t blame him too much — with all the rampant piracy, for a niche publisher it is really hard to make a turnaround: particularly, I think, because I’m guessing that Sony is requiring a really high quality localization since it’s such a Big Release — particularly for an anime game.

I definitely want the light novels! From what I’ve heard of them, they’re awesome and expand a lot on the Disgaea universe. But I can see why he might find them risky, though I find bringing up Rhapsody DS as an example as a bad one, myself– that was a definite fault of the programming, as I would have bought that in a heartbeat had I not heard about the bugs marred in it. I still bought the game in it’s original form, and I beat it, but it makes it disappointing that there is a portable version that isn’t up to snuff.

Long as they translate the light novels “up to snuff”, I think it’d work out.

And god, yes, I want a 3DS Disgaea 3. That would be so awesome. Even just a retelling of the original story using cut-outs like you said would be amazing, when it comes to cut scenes and the sort.

While NISA is definitely against the PSP right now, why not try to market the games on the PSN as being games for the Vita as well? Show support for the newer console! Or even see if they can’t just outright release them onto the Vita like they were trying to do with ZHP to PS3?

Ladius

It would be nice to hear something regarding this option.

malek86

You mean, like how some late GC developers started advertising their games with “playable on the Wii too”? That didn’t work so well.

Besides, who knows if Sony is going to put new rules for the Vita too… since it’s gonna be almost as powerful as the PS3, it wouldn’t surprise me if they said “no bad graphics for retail”. Hopefully they know better than this.

ManaKnight

Actually, Sony designed the Vita to be very open to different types of games at different graphic levels. I actually see them allowing a bunch of PSP ports since they would like a bigger launch of games, and they understand why publishers are hesitant to release stuff on PSP stateside.

If they can manage to push a PSP support line with the Vita, I’ll get one as soon as I possibly can.

I really do hope Sony doesn’t do the whole level of standards of graphics thing with the Vita like they do with the PS3, though. That’s always the somewhat annoying part about Sony.

AxeL

I couldn’t agree more everyone about how the President is; cool, respectful, and considerate of the fans. Literally, just made an account because this two part interview made up my mind about joining. I’ve been a ghost reader for quite awhile now and never wanted to step up!

Glad to see a company I barely knew about three years ago when I was working at GameStop, grow into a company that is well-respected, true to the very core that gave it birth and yet still be small in comparison to other publishers! Great Job NISA.

My apologies if it sounds over thankful but wanted clear everything on the first post since first impressions have a long time image!

This guy is basically what many gaming company presidents should be like

AxeL

Now to business, glad to see NISA step in on the localization part of anime based games since many publishers are either doing too little to make it true to the fans, not attempt a good localization at all, or not give it a try. I’m not a type of person to point companies on the spot so lets just say I’m referring to publishers in general in relation to anime based games.

I can see how some fans may not want that and would rather have NISA focus on bigger or for that matter other projects in general. As for me being a fan of anime and manga of all different generals, I’m more than confident that NISA would do all of us proud and give us no worries.

I’m hurt to see how bad the PSP market is going and trust I reallyyyyy do. Especially since I’m a PSPgo owner! I love the system but right now I’m suffering on games with a 3:1 ratio from PS3 to PSPgo. Overall, I do understand why NISA doesn’t want to take that type of route and I’m all for it. Don’t want to see a great company be hurt on my account.

KuroAlmaz

PSPgo. Ouch. I kinda feel for you. I wanted to like the Go. But no. I have the second gen PSP. When the third gen PSP came out (with the screen issues), I wrote off the PSP line. If the PSPgo was more like the Vita in design, I would have gone for it. The PSPgo was more like the ba$tard child of the series. Not to mention Sony FUBAR on the games like Kingdom Hearts, etc. not coming out except for the pirates and regular PSPs. Sony -10 Pirates 100.

AxeL

Thanks I appreciate that. It’s all good though, I mainly bought it because I’m not always going to be able to buy a game on Day 1 and liked that the games stay on the server once it’s been uploaded. It’s hard to find niche games in my area and PSPgo was a good choice.

You mean to tell me someone other than myself bought the PSP go!? I – I THOUGHT I WAS THE ONLY ONE!

I have a PSP go and a PSP 3000. I personally like the go a LOT more. No UMD to break, no disc drive to break, no memory stick to lose!

I never understood why it got such a bad reputation. I’ve been through three PSPs (1000, 2000, 3000) and I’m currently on my second 3000 and my first go is the only one that’s lasted a year. (mine is almost two years old.

AxeL

yea its crazy how it got such bad rep. at first i thought it was a good thing too but then i heard alot of people didn’t like the fact of having to download a game from the internet. once someone buys a game they want to immediately buy it…but that’s very understandable u know. Also, some people don’t have internet so it’s a extra expense for a game system. none the less i wish pspGo would have got more credit.

ManaKnight

I’m another who likes the PSPGo. I bought mine near release and love how I don’t hear any UMD loading noise, and all my games are in one spot. I think it’s one of the most underrated devices ever. Yeah it doesn’t have every single game in the store, but its the best device made for portable gaming.

Lord Highawesomeparty

I completely agree. The go and the GameBoy Micro are some of my favorite devices because they are so small and the screens are incredible and they do exactly what they were intended to do.

The problem wasn’t the device, just the unrealistic expectations of the buyers.

Corvax

How do you go through 3 PSPs…? No offense, but I have to wonder if the reason why they’re breaking is the way you’re using them rather than the design of the PSP itself.

Lord Highawesomeparty

The PSP 1000 was bricked when my friend took the memory stick during an update. I don’t even need a memory stick for my PSP go.

The 2000 fell into water and broke.

My first 3000 fell about three inches while I was playing Rock Band and the UMD slot broke. No UMD slot on the go.

OverlordFuka

Thank you SO much for asking about the light novels, really. ^_^ I appreciate it a lot, Spencer. Nice to hear just a little bit about it, and now that it’s at least known to them…

Also, lol at Makai Wars. If it really does come out eventually I’ll get it just to see Asagi’s reaction.

Darkrise

“Oh one more thing… there are lots of requests for Hyperdimension Neptunia Mk-2”

Just throwing this out here as food for thought, wouldn’t the break even point be different for each company?

Ladius

I can agree to an extent, but still I think it’s more a problem of adaptability than anything else.

Translating texts surely can cost differently if you employ ex-fantranslators instead of Kajiya production-level translators, but seeing how even niche publishers like Mangagamer can have gynormous scripts translated in a serviceable way for games that barely sell one thousand copies I think it’s more a problem of adapting your business model to make even niche titles profitable than a “it can’t be profitable, period” situation.

Moreover, even licensing costs aren’t an issue in many instances: most Japanese titles fans would die to play could be published by the American or European branch of the Japanese developer at no licensing cost (Tales has Namco, Growlanser has Atlus, XenobladeTLSFire Emblem have NoANoE), for instance.

The major problems here are probably dub (licensing cost for the Japanese original seiyuus andor having to cast your own English dub) and hardware related problems most of us don’t even consider (simply because we lack a complete understanding of the situation), like royalties, hardware houses imposing an unreasonable minimun print run (the “at least 50k” thing for X360 is probably the reason we won’t see anymore Cave retail shmup localized, I fear :), retail stores disliking niche games for dying platforms and so on.

Even more, many companies simply won’t bother picking up a title that is simply going to break even, as sad as it is for us fans.

malek86

You are also forgetting opportunity costs. If Nintendo America for example can use their localization team to work on a game that would sell 10x the copies of another game, why should they want to keep their team busy on the more niche title?

For comparison, a much smaller company like NISA doesn’t have much more profitable games to localize, therefore they’ll work with what they have.

Ladius

There’s also translation outsourcing, though, and using external translators can be even more convenient for occasional projects (at least if you don’t want to employ best-in-class guys like the ones at Kajiya) since you can pay them on a project-by-project basis. Namco is still contracting 8-4 for Tales of Graces F’s localization, for instance.

Of course some companies won’t hire external teams or ex-fantranslators because of internal policies, but, again, it’s their fault if they’re refusing business opportunities simply because they don’t want to adapt their business model to make the most of niche products. XSeed and the visual novel scene show us that we can have high quality translations of gigantic scripts without the need to sell 50k copies (or even 2k copies, in Mangagamer’s case).

That said, as I noted before many companies simply won’t pursue a game if their only prospect is to break even or make a small profit, especially if they are used to big hits.

FireCouch

I’m pretty sure it’s every company’s goal to break even.

Lord Highawesomeparty

Every time I read an interview with this guy I want to run up to him and give him a hug. Over the past two years I’ve almost completely given up on gaming; however, Nippon Ichi just kept me coming back. I love NIS more than any other company out there.

It’s great to hear they haven’t really considered developing for the Wii U since it’ll likely mean I won’t have to abuse my wallet more than it’ll already will this year and next.

And I love how he responded to the Neptunia question. I want to play the first but I can’t find it with the art book. Can anyone tell me if the art book is any good?

‘If it’s on PS3 we will consider it.’
‘Oh one more thing… there are lots of requests for [insert PS3 title here].’
‘No problem.’

NISA is dedicated to a console that holds no interest for me.
Xseed and ATLUS USA, on the other hand, are still publishing PSP titles which make them A-OK in my book. But that’s me being selfish.

ForeverFidelis

Nis, you are welcome very much.

And also it came as a shock to me that Makai Wars is actually spoken about at all over there.

I thought it was a “never gonna happen” joke type deal that employees jibbed about while filling their cups at the water cooler

Guest

Love his response to HN Mk-2. Very happy about that. No I don’t think they should release Atelier early. Once a year is perfect because, make fun of me all you want, I’m still not done with Rorona! Plus I have other games to beat! My point is releasing early would kill my wallet and my game time.

Only other thing is that I don’t understand PSP situation. I was really hopeful for Black Rock Shooter to be localized but hearing NIS prez response is REALLY frustrating and disappointing. I fully understand how publishers feel about the PSP market right now (F***ing pirates). But whats wrong with the Playstation Store? I thought that would be a perfect venue for this situation.

Does NOBODY remember what Capcom did with Fate/Unlimited Codes? They released game only on the PS Store with Jap dubs and (obviously) localized text. I don’t know how that did for them but it couldn’t have costed them much. On top of that, can’t you play DL’d PSP games on PSVita anyway? Pretty sure they showed off MH3 on Vita before. Really disappointed that these points weren’t brought up with the NIS Prez. With all these in mind, why not Black Rock Shooter? If they could just release one last PSP game I would love it to be BRS. I don’t care about anything else JUST BRS.

Weird how he downright says there’s not much market for the 3DS now. A console at launch can be a pretty good place to start. Not much competition yet, and you can build consumer trust.

If they are so worried about the state of the PSP western market, why not develop multiplatform 3DS/PSP games? That sounds like a good idea for NIS. The 3DS might not be selling up to PSP levels, but it’s still the second best selling platform in Japan. And there’s no piracy yet.

I wonder if they’ve been burned by the performance of Disgaea DS. But that game had problems.

Ladius

Problem is, despite being the lead handheld platform for years DS burned all the “NIS cirlce” developers, from NIS to Gust to Idea Factory.
Disgaea 1 DS’s sales were a third of the PSP port, and Rhapsody flopped. Atelier Lise and Annie sold decently, but then Lina was a complete, failure despite being a new, great entry in the series (such a shame, really… I would have loved to see it translated). Likewise, Spectral Force Genesis sold less than the SpectralGoC PSP ports even if it was the last canon entry in the Spectral series (and a nice grand strategy to booth).

Now, even PSP had its share of failures (mainly for NIS), but even then sales were better than on DS, and many PSP were ports instead of new entries (thinking about Atelier and Spectral, for example). I guess that between their extremely good sales on PS3, their somewhat decent performance on PSP (in Japan, the USA numbers must be sad) and their failures on DS and Wii (Phantom Brave LUMA and apparently Sakura Taisen 5) they may have grown wary of 3DS, too, and seeing how the userbase is still tiny even compared to PSP and how that console isn’t exactly breaking sales record I can understand them. Then again, they’re bringing us Cave Story 3D, so they aren’t dismissing that market.

malek86

Cave Story 3D is the third version of the same game in 2 years, which includes one that can be downloaded and played on the very same 3DS for a fourth of the price, nevermind that the original was free.

If this remake ends up flopping because people have already played it so many times in such a short time span, I hope they won’t just think it’s because the 3DS userbase doesn’t care about their games.

If Rhapsody DS sucked, and Disgaea DS was significantly inferior than the PSP version, what were they expecting? But the 3DS doesn’t have these problems, and should be in fact very similar to the PSP in terms of power, cartridge size and controls. I wish they would at least give it a try with multiplatforming. Besides, perhaps people would like playing a 3D Disgaea.

Oh well, in the meantime we’ll see how Abyss performs… even if being a straight port with framerate problems definitely won’t help its case. I think developers aren’t even giving the console a fair chance…

Ladius

Look at it this way: Cave Story is surely a low budget port of an already established indie game, but it’s still far better than what some niche publishers have been doing for 3DS so far (nothing).

Also I wouldn’t be that pessimistic: I think the 3DS userbase is different from the ones that have already enjoyed the original CS, and I think NISA have reasonable sales expectations. It’s a really nice game, and maybe this remake will make a new batch of players enjoy it. Don’t forget NIS has Bikkuriman, too :P

I wish Abyss the best, it’s a great game and the port isn’t as bad as we thought before its release. Frame rate seems to be fine in battles and better than the original in the world map, and loading times have been greatly improved.

I’m gonna have to side [email protected]:disqus on this one. I think the situation NIS in general are in right now is that they feel uncomfortable on any platform other than non-Sony ones because they’re practically unheard of to the other audiences. You have the same few PS3 owners clinging on to NISA as their sole shining beacon of JRPG hope, but other than that (even on PSP, I’d argue), not a whole lot of people care.

It’s partly their fault, too, of course. They never did try to foster an audience outside of the one they have now, but it’s kind of like a chicken and egg situation. Do you take the financial risk to try and expand your audience, or do you stick to playing it safe at the cost of not breaking out of your tiny niche?

Ladius

Of course having a Sony-exclusive status for 90% of their titles has helped them create a strong niche, but as the first part of this interview shows (and I can confirm it from a personal experience with NISA) the NISA guys are really open minded people and never tried to use the “hardware loyalist” card they could easily employ as the publisher of almost half of PS3’s localized jrpg lineup. I imagine the guys at NIS are the same, simply coping with the Japanese market, knowing they are too little to influence it.

That said, the NISGustIF brigade did try to expand beyond the PS3PSP border with some Ds and Wii titles, and sadly things didn’t end exaclty well for them (the only exception being the easy cash-in of Idea Factory’s X360 port, even if they have been published by Aksys rather than NISA).
Is that a consequence of having developed games practically only on PS1PS2 (aside for some minor instances like Gust’s Atelier games on Saturn, GBA, WSC and Dreamcas or Idea Factory’s Generation of Chaos GC port)? Maybe, but at the time it made completely sense since Sony home consoles were jrpg-land and almost no-one could think that things would change so drastically in the upcoming generation.

The paradox you mention is really problematic though, and I don’t think there’s any way to know if it’s better for them to invest in other platforms without knowing if they’re going to lose money (especially since we’re talking about extremely small developers) or sticking to your current fanbase at the price of market diversification.
Personally I would like to see more people as possible appreciate NIS, Gust and IF games, but my first concern as a fan is to see them alive and well.

I’m sure they will support 3DS (aside from CS3D and Bikkuriman) more as soon as sales pick up thanks to the upcoming Nintendo juggernauts, though.

I wouldn’t exactly call what NIS did “expanding” though. I think it says a lot that practically every other Japanese publisher this generation — all of which were very heavily PS2-focused at one time — thrived on the DS for six straight years before moving on to the PSP. A prime example of this is Atlus, who are still succeeding on the DS (and perhaps soon on the 360 as well), despite being a very PlayStation-centric company once upon a time.

Nippon Ichi never really put out any DS games that made the general public want to run out and play them. I don’t think porting games that are already available or playable in a superior form on another system is the way to go about it. The DS resulted in the creation of a lot of new I.P. this generation, and that’s how other publishers succeeded on it.

NIS didn’t really do much in that regard, even on the PlayStation systems for that matter. People often point out how a year without Disgaea is a year in the red for NIS, and it’s true. They’ve made very few smart decisions in the past few years to help themselves, even in their home market. If it weren’t for NIS America licensing games from other developers, Nippon Ichi as a whole would very likely not have survived this generation.

I really like some of the stuff NISA put out. The Prinny platformers are good, the Atelier titles are good (but those are from Gust, who are their own company), and Sakura Wars was really nice to finally have. That said, I don’t think either N1 or NISA are really making smart decisions, business-wise.

Look at Cave Story 3D, [email protected]:disqus said. There’s no real reason for it to exist. There are several different versions of the game out there already, one of them being free. Another version is already playable on 3DS for cheaper. The new version doesn’t capitalize on the 3DS in any manner, and it’s going to come out at a time when more high-profile 3DS games will be in the market. I don’t feel like that’s going to really benefit anybody in the long run.

(yikes, I rambled on way too much there. Sorry!)

Ladius

Atlus’ case is a bit different imho, the (Shin) Megami Tensei brand was around since the Famicom days and they actually maintained a foothold on handelds with spinoffs like Last Bible, Devil Children and Card Summoner (not to mention GBA’s good SMT1 remake) even before DS trampled home consoles during the current generation. Even more, it’s true that they have been able to enjoy success on DS (and PSP), but that has been at the price of having no home console title (not even on Wii!) till Catherine. In a sense, they did exactly the opposite than the NISA brigade (I included Gust in the previous analysis simply because their strong on PS3weak on DS situation mirrored that of NIS).

In a sense, platform relegation has been the trend for little jrpg developers, and an even more extreme case is Falcom’s 100% focus on PSP. The great success they enjoyed with the Trails game in Japan coupled with the countless issues this platform is giving XSEED for their western release actually show how it’s difficult to think on a global scale in such a divided market. Idea Factory, despite all the bad press it gets, is probably the smartest of all considering its success in the last years: releasing low budget titles that are sometimes profitable even with sub-10k sales, covering almost every platform, following up when they see a modicum of success with quick sequels and ports, wisely using limited editions to push sales and proactively pursuing English publishers are all moves they have learned well.

Speaking of Cave Story 3D, I can see the merit of your point. That said, I feel it’s impossible to judge its development without knowing its budget and sales forecast. Cladun and its sequel by System Prism have shown us that NIS can greenlight games with extremely weak sales if they are profitable for their own size. Of course you could say that a more courageous offer would have given them the spotlight on 3DS’s currently almost-empty jrpg niche, and I fully agree on that.

@Ladius:disqus The only reason why the market is divided, is because the PSP is the worst platform ever in the west, while being the best platform in Japan.

And who knows what’s gonna happen once it gets phased out by the PSV: will that suffer the same fate? For all we know, it might not be successful in Japan either. That would be a problem. That’s why I think they should try and spread on some other platforms now that they can, to lower the risk of future damage.

Ladius

@malek86:disqus I think everyone agrees with that point of view, the only problem here is to make the foray into other platforms sustainable without having our beloved developers endangered by low sales. As I said to Ishaan some hours ago, I’m sure NIS will begin supporting 3DS with more robust games as soon as the platform pick up the pace with Nintendo’s upcoming titles. It’s just a matter of waiting some months.

That said, I’m too excited for Aksys’ announcements to comment on PSP’s market divide – thankfully there are still publishers willing to brave those turbulent waters.

@Ladius:disqus But Atlus did have home console titles on Wii! Did you forget Trauma Center and Trauma Team? ;P

I agree — Idea Factory and Gust are both smart companies. Idea Factory were still releasing PlayStation 2 games as late as last year, and they’ve managed to keep their budgets under control. And someone else already pointed this out the other day, but Gust developing PS3 titles with a relatively small staff is a great example of being efficient.

Similarly, Atlus, too, have been very smart by opting to focus primarily on portables and PS2 games. When the time came for them to develop on consoles, they fulfilled niches smartly where needed (Trauma Center/Team) and made sure to create games for a global audience that would get guaranteed attention on high-def systems (Catherine). And well, as much as people like to complain, Atlus USA also publish some excellent western games, and the company even has an entirely separate MMO games division.

Something else I want to point out with Atlus and platform-division. Persona is very clearly a game they felt required hardware of a certain level, and so they kept it off the DS. Instead, DS got its own games like Etrian Odyssey, Devil Survivor, Strange Journey, and Radiant Historia, all of which have been relatively successful.

That said, when the 3DS was announced, alongside all of their other titles, Persona was right there in Atlus’ column on the third-party games list. To me, that’s a smart move because now that there’s another piece of hardware capable of supporting that series, they’re ready to go multiplatform. In the future, 3DS will be a popular system and I have little doubt that Atlus will succeed on it. The same goes for expanding Persona on consoles. I doubt that, after Catherine, Persona 5 won’t be a multiplatform console game.

I guess the point I was trying to make is that Nippon Ichi/NISA never really tried to break out of their small niche, so I do hope Haru isn’t simply assuming that market conditions will never allow them to expand. Look at Carpe Fulgur as another example…two years ago, they didn’t even exist, you know? There’s lots of ways, even within the niche of Japanese games, to expand and cater to different kinds of audiences.

Ladius

Yeah, I forgot the Trauma games on Wii, my bad (it’s even more stupid since I actually bought them XD). That said, I think that Atlus’ current position is good, but it was extremely risky in the past. When Catherine was announced no one would have guessed it could have been an hit, and many old fans (especially in the west) were pretty pissed at the lack of Atlus jrpg on consoles. It’s worthy to notice that this is the first
generation where Atlus has been forced to rely heavily on portsremakes of its older offers.

Regarding Persona on DS… actually, I wonder if P1 and P2 were so out of touch with that hardware, it’s not like they were graphical powerhouses on PSP. I feel their being on PSP is more of a “hardware loyalty” move, since the Persona brand (aside from a cellphone spinoff) has always been on Sony consoles. I would be actually interested to see them developing a Persona game on 3DS just to see how well it does (maybe a PSP3DS Persona 4 port, since the anime is near?).

Also, I fully agree with you regarding the multiplatform development for their next hd title, they’ve already experimented publishing some minor X360 jrpgs in the USA and with Catherine they are probably going to establish a foothold in the niche that bought X360 because of the Japanese exclusive titles, a niche that has been left by its own devices for far too long (aside from little releases like Aksys’Agarest Zero).

JustaGenericUser

The reason Rhapsody DS didn’t do so well is because you effed it up, NISA. (Changed post after remembering/learning more.)

Ladius

I don’t think so, they surely messed up on that one but I fear that game was going to sell poorly from the beginnning : Even in Japan that kind of games has been a flop as of late, and I’m really sad about it since Antiphona no Seikahime was apparently a nice game.

After reading this, I hope Vita turns out to be a successful platform as it seems like it would answer a lot of these problems, acting as a bridge between the huge portable market in Japan and the larger console market in the west.

Ladius

Akenaga interviews are the best interviews :) He is really one of the most forthcoming and honest industry members, it’s rare to have such deep, clear and straight answers.

neo_firenze

Yeah, regardless of whether all of the answers make me happy, he is pretty straightforward and doesn’t give evasive answers like so many in the industry do in interviews.

I’m still disappointed in the general tone of them not wanting to release PSP games in NA (particularly the Imageepoch stuff, and one could reasonably assume the Makai Kingdom port is at risk). But at least the guy is being up front with us.

I expect NISA to jump in like a year from now. Except for the ones you said there’s not much else for them.

SetzerGabbiani

I fully expect Disgaea 1 and 2 to appear on the 3DS at some point…maybe even 3. NIS never misses a chance to port their old games.

Senran Kagura…I doubt NOA would allow it, but you never know.

Methylene

For some reason, the part about the light novels ticks me off a bit. How in the world are they surprised at this? It’s one of the most asked about items on the wishlist since the day that list opened. Oh well, it just proves that NISA doesn’t really give a crap about their fan request pages.

The fact that he brought up Rhapsody as a counter argument for the light novels is a low blow. Yeah, it wasn’t exactly destined to be a super good seller… but try not to forget that it was your messing up of the game that made it sell even worse.

Eric Chan

Meth, I love how you totally overlook the business side of things. Some endeavors will not only fail for some companies, but if taken too far, they will not be in a happy state. You’re telling them to get into too many things. What does this mean? Look at Tokyopop. They specialized in books, but went off on a tagent, and look where that got them. So it’s always better to look at your opportunities first or do something stupid and suffer a loss.

haqua

Wow, crap. I knew this guy was pretty cool but with that ‘No problem’ at the end, I don’t even know what to say.
And hopefully with the Bleach title, NISA will rack in more money- they’re a pretty niche company, so I’m sure they’ll need it.

That is without a doubt the most depressing answer ever. Not because I particularly care about Bleach, but because the PSP might as well not even exist in the West these days. While it’s only gotten better with time in Japan, pirates and so on elsewhere have reduced it to nothing more than a deathtrap for publishers.

We’d be considered lucky to get even a digital-only release, and I really like my physical media. Bah. :( Nice interview otherwise.

Yu_TheKing

The PSP-support is here is just “meh.” It exists but sometimes it seems they don’t they care enough to bring certain titles over. I’m sure the Heat the Soul Series would sell well even if it is digital-only (I’d buy it being a Go owner)

Wow, with an attitude like that these guys definitely deserve to become the big company in the future. They have my support.

Phoenix_Apollo

I guess that’s it for PSP titles then, sadly…;_;

Also, NISA’s smaller than XSeed? Didn’t know that.

KyoyaHibari

Ask about them providing dubs to their animes ;P, I read an article on ANN saying they want to compete with fansubs so that people will legitimately support the animes they are releasing, well what better way to beat fansubbing than with dubs so we can understand the plot in an auditory fashion rather than visually reading the text and grasping it slower and more foreign to us. I am itching to buy Toradora & Katanagatari but I prefer dubs 90% of the time to subs, and I find that dubs>extra goodies with the products as well, things just feel more complete and truly localized with a dub. I mean, I can find a fansub online if I wanted to, (not to say that I watch fansubs) but with dubs added, it gives me more reason to buy the anime knowing it is something I can’t watch online in my native language because it is not the original language of the product so it is essentially different and harder to find online than subs and raw, I mean bonus stuff is also physical so I can’t have it on the internet, but I find that dubs are more essential, I can always get the bonus stuff later if I wanted, but I can’t find a dub track CD to go with the anime later or anything. (Forgive my rambling, I’m a little tired and I’m not making much sense to myself or others probably.)

I’m sad to see my question regarding more visual novels didn’t get asked. I think VNs are a lot more practical to ask about then light novels. Although if they did do light novels, digital e-books for Kindle & Nook would be the way to go. Then they wouldn’t need to worry about how many to print or print on demand or whatever.

The problem with Rhapsody DS is they simply butchered it. They said they couldn’t add in the English voices from the original Atlus release (which I thought were great) because of the extra content in the game wouldn’t be voiced and then we find out they took out the extra content completely. Since I already have the PSX game, I just went and got myself the import of the DS game.
For such a niche game, don’t screw it up, because this is an audience that pays attention.

Hours

Exactly, Rhapsody DS’s “failure” was entirely NISA’s fault. I ended up importing the Japanese version too, because I couldn’t even finish playing the English version after learning what had been done to it.

I don’t like to dig up old drama, and they have improved in some ways since then, but the fact that the president would try to spin it like this is really disappointing.

Also, their lack of support for the PSP is really sad, especially considering how Aksys and XSEED have really been stepping up to the plate in that regard.

HarryHodd

Such a great interview. Thank you

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